Bad News Ahead in the FY13 Federal Budget

Constrained by the limits of the shameful 2011 debt-ceiling budget deal, the Obama Administration is warning progressive groups that they won’t appreciate the cuts facing human needs programs. Community health centers, childcare assistance and anti-hunger programs (to name a few) stand to be severely impacted by cuts in 2013. The potential consequences of these cuts cannot be underestimated and many difficult moral decisions lie ahead for policymakers.

It’s important to remember that we’re in this situation because Congressional Republicans threatened to crash the economy on purpose if the White House didn’t agree to draconian cuts. Nonetheless, leaders of both parties must be held accountable for their moral (or immoral) budget priorities.

As word spread about the draconian cuts facing cities and towns in 2013, LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa sounded off yesterday about Congress and its failed response to America’s budget crisis:

We’ll be monitoring budget proposals in the coming weeks to see which programs face the biggest brunt of cuts and sound the alarm if the budget fails to maintain critical protections for poor and vulnerable people.